Myfirstblog, lets start at the beginning...2010
Tuesday 19th January 2010, 4:44pm
Happy New year!
Okay, so at some point last year, while stuck in a hotel room with nothing but French TV I was trawling the net for things to read, I came across some truly amazing food blogs and thought...I could do that...wise words.... or not... as the case may be.
In all honesty I find it hard to update Twitter let alone a blog, but my website is feeling very neglected and I constantly travel to some amazing parts of the world, so I'm going to try and post a few tit bits and recipes.
I got back form my holidays late last week, feeling slightly like a tanned, under dressed refugee that had been dumped in the Arctic circle....WHAT HAPPENED TO THE WEATHER??? I was sure it wasn't supposed to be this bloody cold.
Anyway, I legged it to stay with some good friends and was greeted with homemade chicken, vegetable soup, wooly socks and central heating. After slowly thawing out I started to get my head round the coming week.
The darling friend I was staying with had a dinner party to cook, for 6, only problem was that she really doesn't cook normally (now I know why I was invited to stay...hahahah)
Anyway, I had a Market Kitchen show coming up, so I practised my Lebanese feast for her dinner. (recipes will be posted on the UKFOOD site, I can't post them here yet) We were up at 8 am for whirlwind food and equipment shopping, then spent a couple of hours cooking and preparing, so all she had to do was pop it in the oven, serve it up and look like she'd been slogging away all day.
I then had to check into my hotel and get ready for an event at The Dorchester. The event was in aid of South Africa and it's wonderful produce (particularly fruit) I had written up 8 recipes using peaches and plums last year and was looking forward to doing the media tour in Feb with Jasmine Harman.
The event went very well and the food was pleasingly good, as at these events it can so often fail, we had Pan-fried Foie Gras, with Boudin Noir and slices marinated pears and apples, followed by Sea bass with baby vegetables, sharp poached plums and a red wine jus. The meal was finished off with Peach Melba and the wine being from South Africa was excellent too.
My night was peppered with txt's from my friend cooking up the Lebanese food at home, the grand finale was the whole dinner party calling me up and cheering at the end result (it all came out extremely well, no disasters.... and she fessed up that it was done with my help)
Back at the event I was wearing a stunning long white dress from Issa, one of my favourite designers that truly made me feel like 20's film star. In this vein I headed to the Art Deco bar at China Tang and imagined I was in Shanghai during its previous hey day...then I stepped outside in the cold and promptly woke up!!
After all that, with jet lag doing it's best, I was off to stay with my Cousins, Aunt and Uncle. We haven't been able to see each other for years, so before I potentially move away from the UK for good, I wanted to say hi. We had a wonderfully lazy weekend, full of sunday papers, Shephard's pie baking, marmalade making and recipe writing.
Then Issy, my cousin, was off to Paris for the week, so we decided to cook a big Asian dinner as a send off on the Monday night. The impromptu menu was as follows, Galloping horses, which is a wonderful, palm sugar caramelised, chilli, garlic and coriander infused ground pork dish. It's traditionally served on fruit slices (like pineapple and satsuma) but I serve it on lettuce cups and top with a brunoise of pineapple and chilli, I also add mint.
Then we made Miso glazed Salmon with cucumber relish, Papaya salad, stir fried rice vermicelli noodles with king prawns and bok choi.
So that's my first blog of hopefully many, I'm on Market kitchen in two days, then I'm off to Paris to indulge in all my naughtiest vices (no, not spending money, drinking champagne and hanging out with unsuitable men, one can do THAT anywhere) but eating masses of Lauderee maccaroons, piles of french breads, Pates, cheeses and oh yes...drinking champagne....well one out of three ain't bad.
Big Kiss x
Here's the recipe for the Salmon...
Miso glazed salmon with cucumber and pickled ginger relish
Serves 2
Marinating time (up to 24 hours, but as long as you can manage, we actually only managed 40 minutes and it tasted great )
Prep time 10 minutes
Cooking time 30 minutes
4 fillets of skinless salmon
For the marinade
3 tbsp of sweet rice miso
2 tsbp of soy sauce
1 tsp of honey
2 tsp of mirin
1 cucumber
150ml of white wine vinegar
2 tsp of sugar
50g of pickled pink ginger
1 tsp of sesame seeds
300g of rice
Mix all the marinade together in a saucepan, bring to the boil, cool, then spread the marinade over the fish fillets, in a dish and leave for at least an hour or overnight if possible.
Cut the cucumber in half length-ways and scoop out the seeds with a teaspoon, then slice thinly on the diagonal. Place in a bowl and rub in the teaspoon of salt. Leave for 15 minutes.
Pour the vinegar into a saucepan and add the sugar, heat up gently and simmer for 5 minutes, then cool.
Thoroughly rinse the salt off the cucumber in cold water, pat dry and cover with the vinegar mix. Cut the ginger into strips and also add to the cucumber and chill.
Then cook the rice, as a general rule I add twice as much water than rice, then bring to the boil and simmer with the lid on, until the water is evaporated. Then switch off the heat and leave to steam for 5 minutes.
To cook the salmon, heat the grill up very high and grill for 8 minutes and until charring. Then serve the salmon with the relish, rice and a sprinkling of sesame seeds.
